


The Farm

by Dark_And_Twisted_Thing



Series: Wise Blood [2]
Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Chiyoh being a babe, Episode: s03e07 Digestivo, Hannibal being very protective and carrying around a hammer, M/M, a lot of a slightly drugged out Will being sassy in his head, a lot of carrying Will around, all the bits of Digestivo which I wanted to be in there, and a ridiculous amount of sperm for a rom-com, featuring: Hannibal wandering around in a stolen coat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-05
Updated: 2016-08-23
Packaged: 2018-07-29 14:07:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,099
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7687486
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dark_And_Twisted_Thing/pseuds/Dark_And_Twisted_Thing
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“I should take him home.”</p><p>Hannibal clenched his bloody hands and gritted his teeth. He knew he should take Will home. He should take him back to Wolf Trap, back to his own bed, back to what he knew. He should disappear into the night and leave Will to his nightmares, sleeping alone in sweat drenched sheets while the monsters clawed at his door. </p><p>***</p><p>An exploration of Digestivo which fills in some of the blanks, picking up from Hannibal escaping and following his efforts to get Will (and himself) away from Mason's farm safely.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

“ _I should take him home.”_

The thought circled around Hannibal’s mind even as he felt his still aching muscles protesting wildly under the dead weight of the barely conscious man in his arms.

_“I should take him home.”_

Kicking open a gilt and brass adorned door, Hannibal entered yet another lasciviously appointed room is this tacky extravaganza of poor taste Mason called a home. As he felt his hands beginning to slip on Will’s sweat slick skin, Hannibal looked around for somewhere to safely deposit his charge before dropping him became the only viable option. Spying an overstuffed antique sofa, Hannibal dumped Will unceremoniously onto the copious cushions and strolled briskly across the room to shut the door. Poking his head out into the corridor and glancing both ways before clicking the door shut, Hannibal reassured himself that (for the moment) there was nobody on their immediate trail, and he felt some of the tension coiled in his frame leave him. He turned and looked at Will, still prepared as if for the operating theatre, sprawled across the couch half-dressed and barely breathing. 

_“I should take him home.”_

Hannibal clenched his bloody hands and gritted his teeth. He knew he should take Will home. He should take him back to Wolf Trap, back to his own bed, back to what he knew. He should disappear into the night and leave Will to his nightmares, sleeping alone in sweat drenched sheets while the monsters clawed at his door. 

Crossing the room, Hannibal knelt beside Will, whose eyes were glazed and unfocused from the drug cocktail Hannibal had administered to him earlier. In order to make his current paralytic state more tenable and to ensure he was not panicked unnecessarily, Hannibal had given Will a mixture of mild sedatives before turning his attention to his would-be torturer. Working quickly and without pity, Hannibal had proceeded to remove Cordell’s face without anaesthetic (after all, when in Rome it was only courteous to behave as the Romans do). Hannibal had turned Will’s face to the wall and spoke reassuringly of their safety in a low and steady voice while he had cut Cordell’s skin from his bone, unwilling to add the fodder for another nightmare to Will’s already crowded mind by making him bear witness to his captor’s gruesome demise. 

Hannibal’s only regret had been that he had been unable to hear Cordell scream as he felt his flesh peeled from his skull. 

With the same hand which had wielded Cordell’s own scalpel against him, Hannibal gently took Will’s wrist between his fingers and found his pulse. Counting the beats of Will’s heart unconsciously and never failing to catch one, Hannibal rapidly considered his options. He knew he was effectively trapped here. Leaving Will was not a possibility, and although he had briefly borne the selfish thought that he would be much more likely to escape on his own, Hannibal was aware that unless he left this place dead, he would not be leaving without Will. Having already killed several men with the hammer currently tucked clumsily into the pocket of his stolen coat, Hannibal was well aware of the unfit and poorly trained nature of Mason’s security staff; however, in spite of this reassurance, there was such a thing as safety in numbers, and Hannibal was forced to acknowledge that being outnumbered could be just as deadly as being outclassed. He could not risk losing Will to a horde of badly trained goons in matching coats any more than he could bear the thought of losing to them himself, and Hannibal quickly dismissed the idea of fighting his way out of Mason’s fortress. 

Above him on the sofa, Will stirred slightly, managing to blink and move the fingers of the hand Hannibal was perilously close to holding. As he sat with his fingers wrapped around Will’s pulse point, Hannibal contented himself with a reassuring squeeze to Will’s wrist before releasing him and speaking quietly. 

“We are outnumbered, Will.”

Will, of course, could not answer, but Hannibal lifted his hand to smooth the stray hair from Will’s forehead before continuing to talk to him.  

“We are outnumbered, but several of them are dead. Mason will die soon, but I am doubtful that we can rely on Margot to assist in an escape. Alana certainly will be of no help - understandably.”

Will blinked, stronger this time, his eyes becoming slightly less unfocused. Hannibal looked up at him, and watched a gentle trickle of blood running slowly down his cheek as the wound begun by Cordell began to seep past the hurriedly applied bandage which was the best Hannibal could manage for the moment. Cursing the lack of time which had seen him all too hastily forced to abandon the well stocked operating theatre which might have allowed him to repair Will’s wound properly, Hannibal ran his finger up Will’s cheek, catching the blood and stopping it in its tracks. Without thought, he lifted his finger to his mouth and sucked Will’s blood from it, tasting the sharp metallic zing of copper against his tongue and knowing it tasted of life. Will held his eyes steadily, and Hannibal saw a hint of amusement flicker behind the haze which still clouded them. Hannibal smiled slightly, but choose not to comment on his own actions, opting instead to continue his train of thought. 

“We need - ”

Without warning, the door banged open abruptly, and Hannibal instantly pushed himself onto his feet, his coat whipping around his legs as he simultaneously spun on his heels and extracted the hammer from his pocket. 

Margot Verger stood in the doorway, solid, unshakeable even in the face of the immanent threat currently eyeing her viciously from across the room. Faintly charmed, she smiled a little joylessly at the sight which greeted her: Hannibal’s fiercely protective glare coupled with the image of his bloody knuckles wrapped around a hammer’s handle should have struck fear into her heart, but Margot had learned to stand before worse men without cowering, and she was not phased.

“Sorry to interrupt,” she said, smoothly. 

Slipping into the room, she momentarily showed her back to Hannibal while turning to close the door - her action deliberately calculated to show both her lack of fear and the trust she hoped would be reciprocated. 

Hannibal allowed himself to relax slightly as he took in Margot’s obvious gambit, knowing it was in her interest that he should survive this and be allowed to leave unhindered. He returned Margot’s trust by slipping the hammer back into his pocket, letting the bloody metal head of the weapon peek out rakishly from the pocket of his stolen coat in a manner which would have appeared ridiculous if attempted by anyone else. 

Margot was perfectly at home in the hideous room, the glittering gold of her shirt allowing her to blend in seamlessly with the overwrought opulence around her, and she leaned back against the gilded doorframe with an air of easy casualness. A chameleon, who chose her clothing and her manner to both please and repel, Margot had learned to stare down the things she feared while advantageously utilising her own shrewd deductions about both her friends and her foes. Will Graham had liked whiskey and comfort, so she had come to him wrapped in fur and bearing a bottle. Mason was tacky, taking pleasure in things that glittered and were showy for the sake of it, and Margot had allowed herself to reflect his sensibilities by choosing a flashy and overpriced wardrobe to adopt in his presence. Alana Bloom was bold, picking out her garments with their overall impression in mind, and favouring the daring patterns and bright colours Margot had since unthinkingly adopted to please her. Dr Lecter had been, in some ways, the easiest to read, and Margot had worn bespoke dress suits almost constantly to all of their appointments, mirroring the decadent (but never crass) dress sense of her therapist without difficulty. Now, as she stood regarding the man who she had last seen tied up naked in a pig pen, she wondered at his ability to maintain his dignity in every situation. 

“You look formidable,” she said, allowing the faint trace of a smile to show on her face as she took in the bloody unlaced boots and the stolen coat buttoned fully to the neckline to conceal the lack of clothing beneath it.  

Hannibal scanned Margot’s face and saw the near imperceptible lines of pain creasing the skin around her eyes. 

“You look as though you are in pain,” he replied. 

Allowing only the briefest flash of agony to show in her eyes, Margot stepped away from the door and walked further into the room. 

“Mason inseminated a pig with the eggs he took from me. He made a Verger baby.”

“Did the child live?” Hannibal asked, his tone flat, the question impersonal and merely inquisitive. 

Margot shook her head. 

“He’s dead. Alana cut it out of the pig, but he was already dead.”

Hannibal ignored the obvious conflict presented by Margot’s variance of pronouns and processed all of this information quickly, realising this revelation would work to his advantage on several different levels and wondering which of Margot’s current emotions to exploit first. 

“Mason made a mockery of you. He gave your child to a pig. A more fitting mother than you,” he said finally, choosing to incite anger principally and grief as an afterthought. 

“He did,” Margot replied simply, her tone controlled. 

Saying nothing, Hannibal bided his time and waited for Margot to continue on her own. While his mind continued to formulate possible routes of escape, Hannibal concentrated carefully on Will’s breathing, focusing on the steady rhythm of air and listening for any signs of irregularity. Hannibal cared about Margot enough to help her, but he was well aware that his motivations for doing so were almost purely selfish, and he entertained no delusions about where his priorities lay in this situation. 

“I would like to know,” Margot continued eventually, “how to extract what I need from Mason with the least possible effort and the most effective result.”

Hannibal knew the question was coming, and he delivered his answer clinically and without emotion.

“The most effective way to extract seamen utilises prostate stimulation. By stimulating the prostate with an electrical current, you can extract a large amount of viable sperm with minimal effort. Electric stimulation of the prostate is often used on animals in order to extract seamen for breeding.” 

Hannibal paused, the ghost of a smile flitting around his mouth. “ A fitting method, perhaps, given the situation, and one easily replicated without the use of specialised equipment. An electric cattle prod would suffice if no aftereffects needed to be taken into consideration.”

Margot considered this piece of information for a moment, her head tilting slightly as she thought. 

“Mason is still knocked out, isn’t he?” she asked, looking directly into Hannibal’s eyes. 

“He is. I left him in the operating theatre. The anaesthesia administered by Cordell should keep him under for the next hour or so.” 

Margot leaned around Hannibal cautiously and glanced at Will, still sprawled out immovable on the sofa, the steady rise and fall of his chest the only indicator that he was not dead. 

“He going to be ok?” she asked. 

“He will live. There will be a scar, but he should suffer no other lasting effects.”

“Cordell was going to cut his face off while he was still conscious, wasn’t he?” 

“He was.”

“Is Cordell dead?”

“He is. He suffered the fate he was seemingly happy to inflict upon another.”

They were both silent for a moment, the sound of a clock ticking somewhere in the room marking the passage of time until Margot spoke again. 

“I have no right to ask you for anything.”

Margot turned away and crossed her arms, wrapping them defensively around her body as she contemplated what she was about to ask.

“But I cannot think of…doing what would need to be done, and I cannot ask it of Alana.”

“You wish me to obtain Mason’s sperm on your behalf,” Hannibal stated dispassionately, immediately allowing himself to factor Margot’s active assistance into his potential departure plans. 

“I would owe you one,” Margot said sardonically, turning back to face Hannibal once again.  

***

Hannibal deposited the cattle prod into the sink of the operating theatre and snapped the gloves from his hands. Sighing tiredly, he turned the gloves inside out and threw them in the medical waste bin, old habits dying hard despite knowing they would no doubt be extracted again later. 

Mason was still under, and Hannibal eyed him with distaste, wishing that he had been conscious for the procedure which would have undoubtedly caused him a considerable amount of distress in spite of his paralysis. Hannibal’s hand slid under the surgical scrubs he had scrounged from Cordell’s supply (the trousers had been to large and were clinging to his hips only by the grace of a safety pin), and his fingers prodded gently at the brand which was currently managing to simultaneously sting and ache. Wincing with pain now that there was no one there to witness it, Hannibal crossed the room to the medical cabinet and selected a variety of supplies which would be of use to both himself and Will. The black coat he had been wearing was hanging neatly on a hook in the corner of the room, and Hannibal was thankful for its deep pockets as he proceeded to fill them with bandages, sutures, medicinal alcohol, and a burn cream he had blissfully managed to find in the depths of a first aid kit. Completing his task, Hannibal turned to check on Will, who was slumped over Mason’s wheelchair in the corner of the room, his vision of the operating theatre mostly obscured by a tactfully placed screen. Although he was still unable to move and was definitely not close to speaking yet, Hannibal could see the glint in Will’s eyes truly returning as the effects of the mild sedative began dissipate. Moving to sit on his heels beside the wheelchair, Hannibal once again gently took Will’s wrist between his fingers and checked his pulse before speaking.

“It is unlikely that Mason will live past the night. Unfortunate now that he would be able to count a considerable number of brand new medical problems as his own.”

Vindictiveness was not a usual emotion for Hannibal to voice, but he was tired, the burn on his back throbbed with every beat of his heart, and he was fairly certain he had torn a muscle in his shoulder. Perhaps a little petty venting was not above him after all, he reflected as he released Will’s wrist and checked the bandage on his face. Again, Will’s eyes registered amusement as he met Hannibal’s gaze, and Hannibal allowed himself to return the amused gaze before he stood briskly and strode to the door of the operating theatre. Opening it brusquely and with the same air he had adopted when opening the door to his old office’s waiting room, Hannibal strolled out of the room and looked for Margot. 

Margot had once again assumed a defensive pose, her arms crossed over her body as she leaned with her back against the wall. Spying Hannibal, she pushed herself upright and raised an eyebrow at him questioningly. 

“You have a vial of what should be viable sperm,” Hannibal told her simply. “I have left it next to the operating table for you. It will need to be kept warm. Keeping it in a warm room or at room temperature will be acceptable in the short term, but it would be advisable to transfer it to a specialised facility for long term storage within the next few hours. Alana will know what to do.” 

Hannibal ran a hand through his hair, pushing it out of his face and feeling every bit as exhausted as he no doubt looked. 

“Thank you,” Margot said, meaning it. 

She harboured no illusions about Hannibal’s motives for helping her, and she was constantly aware that the man before her was one day going to make an attempt on the life of the woman she loved. Still, that bridge would be crossed in due course, and Margot knew she would deal with Hannibal without hesitation on the day he came for Alana. For now though, she was content to express her genuine gratitude for this favour, and allow herself a moment to feel grateful for Hannibal’s help.

“If you would like me to assist you in moving Mason, I would be happy to oblige,” Hannibal offered, somewhat sympathetically taking in the weariness on Margot’s face. 

“Getting him back in his chair should be enough,” Margot replied. 

“Of course.”

Hannibal thought for a moment, his mind flashing wickedly to the thought of Cordell’s flayed face.

“Perhaps we could arrange a small surprise for Mason upon his awakening.”

Margot glanced up sharply, regarding the mischief in Hannibal’s eyes with wariness. 

“What did you have in mind, Doctor?”


	2. Chapter 2

Will blinked. It was basically all he could do, but it was better than nothing. He looked around the dimly lit bedroom, taking in the details in his field of vision for the umpteenth time and feeling his head fully clearing as the sedatives dissipated. The closet against the far wall was open, but Hannibal had momentarily disappeared from sight, and Will assumed he was currently in the bedroom’s _en suite._ After the operating theatre, Hannibal had carried Will to this room under Margot’s guidance, and she had told Hannibal where to look for clothes and how to open the windows should they need to remove themselves from the room via a route other than the door. Will had watched her slip the key to the room into Hannibal’s pocket before she had disappeared through the door, clicking it shut softly behind her. In spite of her tacit approval of he plan which had almost seen his face removed, Will fervently hoped Margot would take herself away from this poisoned place and find some semblance of normalcy in a life far away from here. He remembered the scars he had seen marking her skin, and knew that she had survived horrors most people could only imagine in their nightmares. In spite of his anger at the situation, he could not bear Margot any ill will for the part she may have played in her brother’s plan, and Will watched her leave his life without malice. 

Hannibal had deposited Will neatly on the bed, propping him up gently against the headboard in order to allow him as much sight of the room as possible, before bustling off to raid the wardrobe. Will watched as Hannibal fingered the clothes in the wardrobe without much enthusiasm, committing the uncharacteristically hilarious sight of Hannibal wearing oversized surgical scrubs and a dress coat to memory and feeling amused in spite of himself. 

His thoughts turning to the course of events which had lead him to be propped lifelessly against a stranger’s headboard on a farm full of man eating pigs where Hannibal Lecter was perhaps the lesser of all the evils present, Will pondered the series of distinctly poor life choices which had lead him here. 

If nothing else, this, Will decided eventually, had been a very bizarre few days. 

Returning to the room wearing something which fit him surprisingly well considering it had been stolen from a random (and potentially now dead) stranger’s wardrobe, Hannibal browsed through the closet in search of an outfit for Will. Nothing seemed particularly appropriate, and all of the clothes would be far too large, but Hannibal eventually settled on a plain white button down, a thick grey sweater, and an overcoat which should allow Will to keep warm and stave off shock. The clothes were deposited in a neat pile at the foot of the bed, and Hannibal tipped Will’s still limp form forward, bracing a hand against his chest and reaching for the shirt. 

“These clothes should keep you warm for our trip, Will. We will need to locate a car once we have removed ourselves from the immediate vicinity of the farm, but we may be outside for some time before we find a suitable ride.”

If he had been able to, Will would have snorted.

 _“ ‘Locate a car’ ,“_   he thought. “ _Saying it that way doesn’t make car theft any more dignified, Hannibal.”_

Carefully avoiding the bandage covering his gunshot wound, Hannibal threaded Will’s arms through the sleeves of the shirt and rested him back against the headboard as he fastened the buttons. 

 _“This day cannot possibly get any stranger,”_ Will reflected, as Hannibal gently pulled the sweater over his head, pausing to brush back the stray curls which had fallen into his face during the process.

“I will have to go on carrying you, I’m afraid,” Hannibal continued, “It will be the most practical method of removing you to safety. My apologies if I feel the need to put you down in the snow at any stage. I fear my shoulder has been somewhat badly injured.”

 _“I would say that I can’t really be mad at the guy carrying me through the snow and away from the farm full of people trying to kill me, but since this whole thing is almost entirely your fault, I’m wouldn’t say it even if I could,”_ Will thought, knowing that he wouldn’t actually be saying any of these things to Hannibal if he could talk, but relishing the idea of being pointlessly sassy all the same. 

“The shoes in the closet are all too small to fit you, but I will see if I can find some socks to keep your feet covered,” Hannibal said, rising from the bed and crossing the room to poke about in the chest of drawers next to the wardrobe. 

 _“Hannibal Lecter is finding me a pair of socks,”_ Will thought, dumbly. 

Will was beginning to believe that he was actually still laying on Cordell’s operating table, wondering if the pain of having his face removed might be causing his mind to create some sort of elaborate hallucinatory state where pigs flew and the cannibalistic serial killer who had tried to eat his brain was currently finding him some socks. Feeling Hannibal’s fingers close around his bare ankle and ease a thick wool sock over his toes, Will resigned himself to accepting this strange reality, hallucination or not. 

_“It’s better than hanging upside down in a container which smells like rancid pork fat. And at least my shoulder doesn’t hurt right now.”_

Vaguely aware that Hannibal was speaking to him again, Will attempted to re-focus his wandering mind. 

“…and I believe we can potentially expect some help from her if she was able to gain the information she needed from Jack, but I’m unsure about when she might be arriving and we may not be able to wait for her,” Hannibal was saying, tugging the hem of Will’s trouser leg down and tucking it into the top of his sock.

It took only a moment for Will to realise that Hannibal must be referring to Chiyoh.

_“Well, getting help from the woman who pushed me off a moving train and shot me does seem like the perfect end to this perfect day.”_

As much as he did not relish the idea of seeing Chiyoh again, the more rational part of Will’s brain acknowledged that her assistance in this situation would be invaluable. He was well aware that Hannibal was outnumbered and largely unfamiliar with the terrain he was navigating, and in spite of the people Will was entirely sure Hannibal had killed while trying to locate him, re-capture by Mason’s surviving men remained a distinctly unpleasant possibility. 

Hannibal finished putting on Will’s socks and prowled around the room looking for anything which may prove useful in their escape. He found a Swiss Army knife in the chest of drawers and pocketed it absently, jamming it into his overcrowded pocket and wondering if he should risk departing through the main house or if he should try to get Will through the window. 

Should Will have been capable of jumping violently in his current state, he would have done so when a knocking sound suddenly disturbed the silence of the room. 

Hannibal was too unflappable to jump, but Will saw him immediately pull the hammer from his pocket before making his way to the window, which appeared to be the source of the sound. As he took temporary cover behind the curtains which covered half of the window, Will was treated to the sight of Hannibal sneaking a peek around the corner of the curtain while holding the hammer aloft like a cop gripping his gun. Whatever he saw immediately put him at ease, and the hammer was once again returned to Hannibal’s pocket as he emerged from his cover and pulled open the catch on the window. 

“It is good to see your face again,” Hannibal said, stepping back and holding the curtain aside to allow Chiyoh to step into the room, elegant as ever in spite of having to bend nearly double to get both herself and the large rifle strapped to her back through the window. 

Chiyoh straightened up and pulled the window shut behind her. She inclined her head gracefully to acknowledge Hannibal’s greeting before turning to survey her surroundings. 

“This place is not pleasant,” she observed stoically, frowning as she spied Will propped up on the bed. “He is still alive?”

“He is. And he will remain so,” Hannibal replied. 

Chiyoh shrugged. 

“What’s wrong with him?” she asked, not expecting an ecstatic greeting, but puzzled by Will’s apparent lack of any sort of reaction to her presence. 

“He was injected with a paralytic agent. It has rendered him temporarily unable to move or speak.”

“Only temporarily?” 

“Yes, he should hopefully suffer no lasting effects,” Hannibal replied, ignoring the obvious jibe.

“Mmm,” Chiyoh agreed, noncommittally.  

From his position on the bed, Will rolled his eyes.

Turning her back to Will, Chiyoh returned her attention to Hannibal.

“Are you armed?” she asked, glancing down at the hammer in his pocket. 

“I have a hammer and a pocket knife.”

Chiyoh raised an eyebrow and looked at him.

“While I do have faith in your abilities, I don’t think those weapons will be sufficient to successfully escape from this place without help. I counted eight more men on the outskirts of the house, a guard in the security station near the gate, and three more men inside the house. I also saw two women and a man who appears to be currently unconscious and in a wheelchair.” 

“Mmm. The unconscious man would be our host here, Mason Verger. The two women are not a threat.”

“Should Mason Verger be considered a threat?”

“No, he will be dead not long after he regains consciousness.”

Chiyoh nodded and pulled a hunting knife from her pocket, handing it to Hannibal handle first. 

“I discovered this in the apartment where you brought Will. I assume it is the knife he attempted to stab you with. I also found his passport, his glasses, and his phone. Would you like those also? The phone is dead.”

Hannibal tucked the knife into his waistband and nodded. 

Chiyoh pulled the items from her pocket and gave them to Hannibal, who stuffed them into his apparently bottomless coat pockets.  

“I have no further weapons to give to you, but I will be able to provide you with covering fire should you be spotted by any of the men patrolling the grounds. I have chosen a route for you which will allow you to get a fair distance from the house before you are potentially seen, although it is not likely that you will be able to leave the grounds completely without being spotted.”

“Thank you Chiyoh.”

Again, Chiyoh inclined her head in acknowledgement. She turned to the window and opened it. 

“Leaving now would be advisable,” she said, putting one foot on the ledge. 

“I am bringing Will.”

Chiyoh looked vaguely surprised and somewhat annoyed. 

“Your chances of escaping alone would be much higher.” 

“I know.”

“I assume you have the key to this room? It is unlikely he will be discovered before Mason Verger’s death, and I assume the women are not a threat to him.”

“They are not.”

Chiyoh sighed. 

“So why bring him with you?”

Hannibal contemplated this question for a moment, his gaze drifting to Will, who looked back at him with bright, unwavering eyes. 

“Because,” he answered eventually, “he is mine.”

 

***

 

Will was screwing his eyes shut and fervently praying for death. If the humiliation of Chiyoh getting his arms into the overcoat Hannibal had found for him was not enough, he was now being bundled through a small window by two people who were both trying to kill him 48 hours ago, and Will was currently attempting to make his limbs work again through sheer willpower alone.

“Mind his head,” Hannibal said, gripping the back of Will’s trousers to support his waist while Chiyoh simultaneously tried to get both herself and Will’s upper body through the window. 

Chiyoh shot him something very much like a dirty look and said nothing. 

Jumping down from the window sill, Chiyoh helped Hannibal regain his grip on Will, gently manoeuvring his head into the crook of Hannibal’s arm. 

“Are you injured?” she asked, her brow furrowing slightly as she took in the minute creases of pain which momentarily lined Hannibal’s features.

Chiyoh knew that he would never complain about any injuries he may have sustained (he was much more likely to continue on until he collapsed rather than admit weakness), but she was quicker than most and recognised that for any physical acknowledgement of pain to show on Hannibal’s face must mean that he was quite badly hurt. 

Hannibal clasped Will tightly in his arms, letting the dead weight of Will’s body distract his mind from the increasing agony in his shoulder while he replied. 

“I have sustained a few injuries, but I will be sure to deal with them as soon as the situation allows.”

“You have injured your shoulder,” Chiyoh replied, noting the almost imperceptible slouch in Hannibal’s posture, and the fact that he was allowing most of Will’s weight to rest on his right side. 

“I have, but it should not impede my progress or my ability to carry Will.”

Saying nothing but very loudly thinking “ _you wouldn’t have to worry about any of this if you would just leave him here”_ , Chiyoh turned away from the house and gestured towards the tree-line. 

“We need to get out towards the woods. There’s a small ridge further around the house which is surrounded by trees. As you begin to cross open ground, you will no doubt be spotted, but there’s only one break in the tree-line and I can cover you until you reach the woods. Once you are safely in the woods, continue east until you see the road. I have left a car for you parked near the road, it should be visible if you remain on a straight path from the ridge. The key is inside the car under the driver’s seat. The car is not stolen and nobody will be looking for it. You can keep it for as long as is needed. There is a licence and a passport for you in the glove box.”

“Thank you. I am in your debt, Chiyoh.”

As they walked in silence towards the perimeter of the farm, hugging the walls of the house, Hannibal’s mind wandered back to his choice regarding Will’s fate. He still knew the right choice would be to take Will back to his house at Wolf Trap, but as he held Will’s warm body close enough to be able to feel the beat of his heart, Hannibal found this course of action to be increasingly difficult to contemplate.

“What are you going to to with him?” 

Chiyoh’s quiet question broke his reverie, and Hannibal marvelled at her almost unprecedented ability to be able to read him. 

“I have not decided,” he admitted, realising Chiyoh would most likely know if he lied. 

“You want to keep him?” Chiyoh asked, the intonation posing the phrase as a question to be answered.

“He could not be kept. He must choose his own course of action.”

“But you took him with you.”

“I could not leave him there. Perhaps it was an unreasonable impulse to take him with me.”

“Will you take him with you further?”

“You are asking if I will run with him.”

“Yes.”

Hannibal looked down, regarding the man in his arms and watching as those inscrutable eyes stared back at him, clear and strong.

“Perhaps. If he would prefer to return home, I will be content. I will take him as far as he wants to go and no further.”

 

***

 

Hannibal was limping slightly now. Adding insult to injury, he had crashed into a small stone statue of a winged pig which had been hiding in the undergrowth near the house, and he had almost let Will go flying before regaining his balance and cursing the sort of man who would think stone pigs were a suitable decoration for a garden. Still, in spite of the indignity of essentially stubbing his toe, Hannibal had managed to get Will over the ridge and across the clearing near the house, resisting his natural urge to duck as he heard Chiyoh’s rifle crack the air around him. He had counted eight shots during his trip to the cover of the tree line, and nobody had pursued him past the trees which marked the edge of the main Verger estate. Although his shoulder was throbbing painfully, Hannibal had managed not to put Will down on his way through the woods, and it was with a sense of overwhelming relief that he finally spied the car Chiyoh had sequestered for him near the road. 

The car turned out to be an older model mid-range Jeep with an unobtrusive grey finish and some heavy duty winter tires, and Hannibal deeply appreciated the vehicle choice which he knew would be more than adequate for their journey but which would not draw any unwanted attention. Not without some difficulty, Hannibal managed to get the passenger side door open while still holding Will, before placing him gently onto the seat and threading his arms carefully through the seatbelt. 

“We will be driving for quite a while, Will, and it may be easier for you to sleep now. The paralytic will continue to work its way out of your system while you sleep, and you should regain most of your movement in a few hours.”

Hannibal secured the seatbelt and tilted his head slightly to look into Will’s eyes, his fingers probing gently along the side of Will’s neck in order to check his pulse once again.  

“Your pulse is much stronger now, and your heart rate is returning to a more normal pace.”

Will’s eyes glinted brightly, looking at Hannibal steadily and without fear. Hannibal remained there for a moment, leaning over Will with his fingers brushing over his pulse point, caught by this man’s ability to know what he was and still look into his eyes without flinching.  

 _“I gave you a rare gift…you didn’t want it.” -_ the memory of the night he had fully revealed himself to Will resurfaced, unbidden and unwanted, and Hannibal flashed cold as he remembered the warmth of Abigail’s blood spilling over his hands. 

“You said you forgave me,” Hannibal said, his hand moving to curl around Will’s cheek, “I wonder if you will continue to forgive me.” 

A dark cloud of pain deepened the colour of Will’s eyes, but he did not look away. 

Hannibal sighed, his hand briefly running over Will’s shoulder before leaving him and crossing to the driver’s side of the car. Feeling for the promised key under the seat, Hannibal fired up the engine and prepared to finally drive away from the horrors of the Verger estate. 

Somewhere in the dark recesses of the mansion behind them, Margot and Alana held each other tightly while Mason’s lifeless body floated face down in his eel tank. As the grotesque eel circled around Mason’s pathetic corpse in a graceful figure eight, Hannibal shifted the car into gear and spoke softly to his passenger.

“Sleep, Will. We have a long way to go.”

 


End file.
